Raffkind: Social communication doesn't mean awareness

Welcome to the world of 2013 — the world of cyberspace and social interaction.

Whether it be TV reality shows, Facebook, Twitter, blogs, YouTube or websites, everyone — it seems — has an opinion. And avenues for expressing one’s ideas are seemingly endless.

Moreover, with the proliferation of public opinion polls, we can gather feedback in an instant on just how many agree or disagree with us.

That this needs to be a part of something larger than ourselves is certainly nothing new. It seems to be an integral part of human nature, and for as long as history has been recorded, people would gather together to commemorate life events. And for most of us, joy that is shared is heightened, grief shared is lessened.

Undoubtedly there are many advantages to having the “world of others” literally at our fingertips. Equipped with only a cellphone, we can access almost any type of knowledge, and in an instant, we can know what others are thinking — and hence validate our opinions and ideas. And yet, at the same time, the easy availability of so much information has some unanticipated negative consequences.

One of these is the perception many people have that they are experts on a topic on which they really know little.

Think about it. When was the last time you heard someone on YouTube, talk radio or cable TV say, “I just don’t know” or “I don’t have enough information to express an opinion”?

After I retired from teaching at West Texas A&M University, I found one of the things I missed the most was being around people who knew enough to know that they didn’t know it all. I found this particularly relevant in the area of psychology. I am amazed at how many people listen to media psychologists give advice or express an opinion on who is right or wrong without hearing more than one side of an argument.

A few days ago, I was tuned into a cable TV network and heard a psychologist counseling a young girl who was complaining that her mother was stalking her. The psychologist consoled the girl, told her she was entitled to her privacy, and advised her to report her mother to child protective services.

As I listened, I wondered what the mother was thinking, what were the circumstances that led up to the “stalking,” and whether the mother was perhaps trying to shield and protect the girl. Yet, because of time constraints, this was never addressed, and soon I heard a commercial advertising a product often used by young girls.

Need I say more? The dollar speaks louder than sound advice, and the media psychologist was boosting her ratings and entertaining her audience.

Another danger of the preponderance of cyber knowledge is the difficulty in knowing the accuracy of the information we hear. A good example of this is Manti Te’o’s girlfriend, Lennay Kekua. Now, not being a football enthusiast, I must confess that I might never have known who Te’o was until I listened to the news and heard about his phone conversations and fairy tale romance. Kekua just might have been the most talked-about female celebrity on the news that week, and seemingly it made little difference that she existed only in the world of cyberspace imagination.

Still another problem comes from the oversimplification of complex issues.

Anyone attuned to news these past few weeks must be familiar with the numerous polls that have been taken on gun control.

Almost all plans that have been proposed to deal with gun control contain multiple provisions such as a ban on assault weapons, more careful background checks on people purchasing guns and restricting the availability of violent video games. And yet, the polls taken and reported ask only general questions or address only one of the issues.

Although it is somewhat entertaining to know what others think and it may give us a false sense of satisfaction in knowing we are doing something, it seems to me that we are going to have to recognize the magnitude and complexity of the problem, examine studies that address each of the provisions separately, look at short- as well as long-term cultural changes and disregard public opinion before we can effectively enact legislation that hopefully puts an end to the senseless mass killings that have become all too frequent in current society.

It was once said that technology is more advanced than our ability to deal with it. Perhaps this is true both with respect to cyberspace and modern weaponry. We cannot go back in time, nor would most of us want to.

As we work to find solutions to some of our problems, we will continue to use modern technology both for entertainment and fact-based knowledge with heightened awareness of the difference between the two.

Myrna Raffkind is retired from the behavioral sciences faculty at West Texas A&M University. She lives in Amarillo and volunteers with many nonprofit groups.